


A Specter, A Reaper, A King

by humanitys_cutest



Category: DBSK | Tohoshinki | TVfXQ | TVXQ
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-27
Updated: 2014-04-27
Packaged: 2018-01-21 01:49:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1533227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/humanitys_cutest/pseuds/humanitys_cutest
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Changmin's at a place he doesn't recognize, even though he distinctly remembers getting into his car.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Specter, A Reaper, A King

**Author's Note:**

> For those wondering, I will be updating Bet this week. It just has to go through beta, and it should be up in a few days. Sorry for the ridiculously long delay ^^;;
> 
> Meanwhile, enjoy this! Even though it's unbeta'ed!

The last thing Changmin remembered was getting into the car to meet up with his friends at the mall. The new _Captain America_ movie had come out and Changmin had been dying to see it. He had managed to bribe his best friends with the promise of food if they came with him, and they had accepted, however grudgingly.

But Changmin never made it to the mall. Apparently.

 ***

When Changmin opens his eyes, he’s in a place he doesn’t recognize. He’s standing in the middle of a...space? It can’t be called a room, there aren’t any walls or corners as far as he can tell. There’s a vast openness, a nothingness to the place that makes Changmin’s skin crawl. _At least there’s a floor_ , Changmin thinks. There’s a lot of grayness too. The air around him is a shimmering sort of gray, almost like a fog, but darker in color. It’s cold, too, and he shivers in his soft, ice blue shirt with the short sleeves. _What is this place?_

It had been summer when he left his house, he doesn’t understand why it’s so cold right now.

All he knows is that he doesn’t like it at all. There’s an eerie feeling to the place making the hair on the back of his nape rise and goosebumps pebble his skin. He shivers again, slightly afraid, and rubs his hands up and down his arms.

A sound goes off in the distance. Changmin stills to listen to it carefully, and he is able to make out the sound as some sort of train whistle, accompanied by the clang of bells. As he listens the sound becomes clearer. After a moment he realizes it’s because whatever it is is coming closer and closer, and Changmin takes an involuntary step back, heart in his throat.

And then a man’s silhouette appears from the gray fog, off in the distance, the bells clanging louder and the train whistle almost shrieking the closer the man comes, and Changmin is terrified.

The man’s silhouette is dark and huge, becoming bigger with each step the man takes. Changmin is rooted to the spot. He knows he should run, should get away from the stranger whose coming makes the bells clang ominously, but he just _can’t move_.

And then the gray fog sweeps aside and lays itself down for him, a path made of solid smoke for the man to follow straight to Changmin.

And then he’s there, the lower half of his body covered by the gray fog that continued to swirl around him thickly, and the train whistles and the clanging bells stop, much to Changmin’s relief.

The man is standing before him, his shoulders broad and his muscles visible through his tight, black shirt and his face...his face is... _normal_. Exceedingly handsome, but still normal.

His eyes are slanted and warm, nose completely straight, lips a perfect bow shape. His hair is as dark as night, swept up off his forehead.

Changmin doesn’t know what he was expecting, but he sure wasn’t expecting the man to look human.

The man has two eyes and a nose and a mouth and two ears, just like a human, and yet...something seems off about him. Changmin can’t place his finger on exactly what, though.

“Hello,” the man says, a kind smile on his face, his voice a deep baritone and lilting like music, somehow fear inducing and soothing all at once.

Changmin swallows. “Hi.”

“I’m Yunho. What’s your name?” The thick gray smoky-like fog continued to spiral around him.

“Changmin,” he says, but his voice is small, so he tries again. “I’m Changmin.”

Yunho smiles wider. “Hello Changmin. What are you doing here today?”

Changmin looks around at the nothingness of the place. “I...I don’t know,” he says hesitantly.

“Oh, you’re one of those poor souls,” Yunho says, not a hint of sympathy in his voice, but before Changmin can ask what he means, Yunho moves and Changmin receives the shock of his life.

The man has no legs.

In the place where a normal human’s torso meets their thighs, Yunho has a swirling fog, just like a genie from a lamp, except instead of blue, Yunho’s fog is as gray as the air around him. His fog swirls down from right to left to right, all the way to the floor.

Changmin takes a step back in shock, mouth gaping as he stares at Yunho’s fog.

Yunho just laughs. “Oh, don’t be frightened, I won’t hurt you,” Yunho says as he floats closer. He seems almost... _playful_.

“What are you?” Changmin blurts out, rather rudely.

Yunho doesn’t look offended though. “Me? Oh I’m a lot of different things. I’m a specter, a ghost, a genie, a reaper of the dead, a king...” Yunho keeps going on, but Changmin has stopped listening.

His heart stops. One thing stands out, like a fly caught in a sticky web. “A reaper of the dead?” he says weakly. _Oh God, is he dead? Is that what this creepy, gray nothingness is? A land for dead people?_

Yunho stops his rambling and looks at Changmin, and when Changmin sees the pity in his eyes he wants to scream.

“Am I dead? I can’t be dead! I was just going to the mall to see a movie with my friends, they’re waiting for me, I have to go _now!_ ” His voice rises as he goes, and he knows he sounds hysterical but he can’t stop himself, he can’t be _dead_ , dead is what happened to other people, not him who was just going to see a movie.

“Calm down, Changmin, you’re not dead,” Yunho says, hands up placatingly, his voice as calming as the sounds of waves on a clear night. “Just relax, take a deep breath.”

So Changmin does. He gulps in a lungful of air and holds it in, and then breathes out. He does this over and over again, until he feels the panic start to ebb away and his heart is calm again. Yunho watches the entire time, patiently waiting.

“Better?”

Changmin nods. He doesn’t trust his voice.

“Okay, good. You’re not dead, but you’re not exactly alive either.”

Changmin is stricken. “Am I going to die?”

“Who knows? Currently you’re in a hospital bed, your mom holding your hand and crying next to you, your sisters crying while hugging each other, your dad crying in the bathroom because he doesn’t want your younger sisters to see his tears. Your best friends are out in the hall, waiting for you to wake up.”

Changmin’s heart sinks further and further as Yunho speaks. “So what am I doing here?”

Yunho slinks closer, his fog swirling. “Well, I can’t say I really know. This is the place between life and death. Usually people die or they don’t, and those that don’t know end up here. So really, _I_ should be the one asking you that. What _are_ you doing here?”

“I don’t know, though. Why do other people end up here?”

Yunho twirls in the air as he speaks, doing back flips and spins and being generally annoying. “Well, some people have wanted to die for a while, but not in the way they actually did. Others were longing for a lost one. Some others _should_ die, but the higher ups took pity and gave them a choice.” Yunho looks at him, though he doesn’t stop moving around. “So, Changmin, tell me, did you have a death wish gone wrong?”

“No,” Changmin says, aggressively shaking his head. He just wanted to see a goddamn movie, not die.

“Well then, have you lost a girlfriend you loved? A relative maybe?”

Changmin shakes his head again. “I don’t have a girlfriend. And all of my family’s alive.”

"Ah, as I suspected. You’re from the third category then,” Yunho says, circling around Changmin and looking him up and down.

“Can you stop doing that?” Changmin says, irritated and just the smallest bit uncomfortable with the way the man... _thing_ was watching him.

Yunho gives him a boyish grin, but stills in front of him again. “Sorry, I can’t really keep still. Mom says it’s because I’m the devil’s son,” he says cheerfully.

Changmin stares at him. “Are you really?”

“Oh yes, one of many,” Yunho says, waving a hand dismissively. “But we’re not here to talk about me, we’re talking about you.”

Right. “Right,” he says out loud. “So, um, the...higher ups took pity on me?”

Yunho grins again. “I think so,” he says, and he starts circling slowly around Changmin again, once again sweeping his eyes over his body. “I suspect it’s because you’re so young. And pretty,” he adds as an afterthought, eyes lingering on the long column of his neck.

Changmin scowls, heat creeping up his neck and staining his cheeks red. “I’m not pretty.” He’s heard that enough to be annoyed by it.

“You are though,” Yunho says, now floating upside, his eyes level with Changmin’s. They’re lifted at the corners, full of mischief. “Your eyes are like Bambi’s. You should be glad, you’re lucky they wanted to give you a chance.”

Changmin ignores his comments. “This is a chance, then?”

“Yupp.” Yunho rights himself. “You can decide whether you want to come with me and move on to the world for the dead, or you can go back to living.”

Changmin thinks. “What’s the world of the dead like?”

“World _for_ the dead,” Yunho corrects. Changmin rolls his eyes. “It’s nice, I suppose. A lot like living, except bad things can’t happen to you if you’re in the right place. No sickness, no death, no heartbreak. It’s just complete happiness, all the time.” Yunho makes a face. “It’s sickening, to be honest.”

Changmin smiles for the first time. Yunho notices and grins in response. “You should smile more, you look even prettier.”

Changmin immediately glares at him, and Yunho laughs. “And I’ll be in the right place?” he asks, bringing the conversation back to the point.

“Oh yes. You’re young, what, 17? You haven’t had as much time to fuck up.”

Changmin thinks about this.

“So, what’ll it be? Where do you want me to take you?” Yunho asks, doing his annoying back flips in the air again.

Changmin takes a deep breath. “I think...I want to go back. Home.”

Yunho stops moving around. “Are you sure? You won’t be able to change your mind.”

Changmin nods. “I’m sure.”

Yunho comes closer. “Absolutely sure? You could...come with me,” he murmurs, his voice oh so tempting, breath wisping over Changmin’s lips.

Changmin shivers, and then shakes his head to clear it. “I’m sure,” he says again firmly, even if his voice comes out a bit higher than normal.

Yunho leans away and smiles.

“Alright, off we go then.” He comes closer again and grasps Changmin’s forearm, and immediately Changmin feels as though someone dunked him in a freezing cold ocean. He shivers violently, teeth chattering, and Yunho sends an apologetic look his way.

“Wait! I have a question,” Changmin says through his chatters, even though Yunho’s hand is so cold he thinks he’ll die all over again.

Yunho lets go and floats back. “Yes?”

Changmin rubs his forearm, trying to warm it slightly. “Is this real? Or all in my head?”

Yunho smiles. “Do you know Albus Dumbledore?” he asks in reply.

“Yes?” Changmin says, puzzled.

“Great man, if a little twisted. I met him once. Anyway, he said once ‘Of course it is happening in your head, but why on earth should that mean it’s not real?’”

And before Changmin can ask what Yunho meant by saying he met Dumbledore once, or even what he meant by that quote, Yunho takes his arm again and that feeling of drowning in ice cold water comes again and Yunho pulls him up, and everything faded to black.

***

His eyes open again, and this time he’s in a white space. No, _room_. He’s in a white room.

A hospital room.

A man enters his field of vision. There’s a kind smile on his face. “Hello Changmin. I’m Dr. Yunho. It’s good to have you back with us.”

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are love ^^


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